


Bad At Love

by rosethorngirl



Category: Batman - All Media Types, Catwoman - All Media Types, DCU (Comics), Green Lantern - All Media Types, Justice League - All Media Types, Superman - All Media Types
Genre: Bruce Wayne is Bad at Love, Bruce Wayne's Romantic History, F/M, I swear, I will finish this, Inspired by song, M/M, Time Skips, WIP
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-10
Updated: 2018-01-10
Packaged: 2019-03-03 00:23:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,536
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13329570
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosethorngirl/pseuds/rosethorngirl
Summary: I'm bad at loveBut you can't blame me for tryin'You know I'd be lyin' sayin'You were the oneThat could finally fix meBut lookin' at my historyI'm bad at love





	Bad At Love

17 Years Ago:

Hesitancy wasn’t his usual style, he thinks to himself. 

If you could even say he had a “usual style.” According to Alfred, he tended to be a little too brash and overzealous to care about anything related to style.

Which was probably fair, all things considered. 

Nonetheless, here he was feeling rather hesitant. Maybe even slightly nervous. 

The last time he had felt nervous…well, no that doesn’t need to be thought about right now. Not when he wants to, well…do what he’s about to do.

He shifts the box in his overcoat pocket and suppresses the want to bite his lip. 

He’s doing the right thing. He loves her. She loves him. It was obvious they were meant to be together, and his mom had always told him to follow his heart. So what if Alfred doesn’t know yet. He’s never had anything bad to say about Selina…never had anything particularly great to say about her either, but…

He’s overthinking this.

He exhales a sigh. If he’s going to do this and make this choice then the first thing he needs to do is actually knock on the door.

He raises his hand to start to knock when he hears it. Just the faintest of moans, but he knows what she sounds like. He knows it so well; he could be in a crowded room of people and pick her voice out. 

For a moment he freezes, hand raised in position to knock and processing. It’s the second moan that causes him to snap out of his daze. 

Selina is…Selina is having sex; and it’s not with him. His heart beats wildly as his eyes tighten around the edges and his mouth pulls into a deep grimace. What does this mean? What is she doing?

Should he charge in there? What if she’s being hurt? Obviously, she wouldn’t be cheating on him, there’s been a mistake…

And right when he thinks that is when he hear her voice, as clear as day calling out a name. His first instinct is break down the door and save his girlfriend when his mind catches up with the tone and pitch and he finally let’s reality sink in. 

His shoulders droop but his eyes harden as he reaches in his pocket to grip the ring box.

Selina Kyle is having sex.

And it’s not with him.

For the second time in his life, Bruce feels true heartbreak.

7 Years Later:

He’s standing in the cave staring intensely at his suit, wearing the remains of his tuxedo.

Bowtie lying limply across his shoulders, top four buttons undone, and belt off. He has a half empty glass of good scotch on his desk and looks for all the world like a man who’d rather not be bothered.

Which of course is when he feels the cool breeze across his face, making him grunt in tiredness and irritation.

“Bruce, I’m sorry, I know you had an important evening planned; but I listened and heard you down here. So, don’t be mad at me. I just really need...” Clark rapid fires without a breath, then truly looks at his friend for the first time that night, “…what’s going on?”

Bruce snorts and turns away from his suit, showing his increasingly chummy friend his red-rimmed eyes and despondent expression. “What do you need, Superman?”

“I-I just wanted to ask for those files I know you were working on about team building, so I could have a jump start for the monthly meeting. Figured Superman ought to know what his second in command was doing so there’s no confusion…” Clark watches him.

Bruce nods and turns to walk to his computer banks.

“What’s going on, Bruce?” Clark asks, coming to stand relatively close to the Gothamite, but not within his personal space.

Bruce clears his throat as he opens up his server and forwards his notes to Superman. “Miss Madison has declined my offer. She seems to be…distraught by the current state of things.”

Clark sucks on his tongue, assessing Bruce critically. “She…said no?”

Bruce barks a bitter laugh. “She said no, then broke up with me. But promises to keep this information to herself.”

Clark gasps, “Oh Rao. Bruce, I’m sorry…”

“I don’t need your apologies, Superman,” Bruce says curtly and sends the last bit through. “Truthfully I’m not that surprised. Nor am I that…cut up about it you could say.”

The Kansas bred superhero’s brows drew together in confusion. “Not that surprised?”

“No,” Bruce grunts. “I’m Batman, she can’t handle it. I’m not going to beg her to stay.”

Clark sounds distressed when he bursts out with. “Well why not?! You need to! You love her!”

Bruce grimaces. “I…thought I was. Obviously I believed she felt the same. She does not. Life moves on, the mission does not.” He closes his tabs and stands to walk towards his glass.

Clark steps forward, “Bruce…”

“Enough,” the billionaire growls and spins around, holding the scotch. “If I say I’m fine, I’m fine. She doesn’t have to marry me, and maybe it’s for the best. I am, after all, only twenty-five. Now, you have your stuff, please go home.”

Bruce tries down his glass and turn to allow the other man to leave but he hears Clark growl determinedly. “You may only be twenty-four, but I don’t see how that relates to this?”

Bruce groans as he finishes swallowing, thankful for the burn and gives the man a deadpan look as Clark barrels on.

“You did love her. I know you did. You feel about her the same way I do about Lois. Why won’t you fight for her love?”

Bruce scoffs. “I was infatuated. I know real love, Clark. I would be far angrier and more upset right now if I had felt as strongly as you seem to think I did. Please go home to Lois, and let me drink in peace.”

Clark sets his jaw and straightens his shoulders. “Fine. I’ll leave. But call Julie. See if you can’t get her to change her mind. Not for me, for you. You deserve that closure, so that later when you pull your head out of your ass, you won’t wonder what would’ve happened if you had.”

With that, Superman was gone and Bruce rolled his eyes.

Later, with no one else around, Bruce does call. He’s put through to voicemail. He doesn’t leave a message,

10 Years Later (Present):  
Standing by the graves of his parents has always caused Bruce to lose track of time. 

It was partly why he did it, to clear his mind of the noise for a while. What do his parents care of him loitering around for hours in silence? A statue of lives long past, long dead, and long gone; but ever still the man behind the bat standing as if in a morbid mirror of a candlelight vigil. Only, there was no candlelight and the vigil was represented in a life dedicated to violence and destruction.

Usually, Alfred allows it to go on without interruption until he either comes in from the cold half frozen to death or the butler physically drags him away to feed him. Which is why he’s startled when he feels the strong, powerful hand on his arm.

“It wasn’t your fault, you know?” the kind and familiar Southern voice tells him. 

Bruce holds in his weary sigh and doesn’t deign to respond to the social pleasantry he feels is undeserved. What use does he have of pity? Or worse, what use does he have for sorrow on his behalf? It doesn’t bring them back; it doesn’t ever bring anything back, not even good memories. 

“I’m really sorry, B,” Clark continues with a heavy voice and softly rounded consonants that are related to his farmboy persona. 

Bruce knew better though. 

“You shouldn’t be out here in this drizzling rain, buddy,” the blue-eyed alien sighs and casts a glance out over the gloomy grounds beyond the tombs and subtly wipes his face of the mist that had accumulated while he must have been walking towards the billionaire. “You’ll get sick out here.”

“And die?” Bruce snarks with a slightly caustic glare. “What do you want, Clark? Did Alfred call you?”

Clark pulls back and looks him over intently, “He didn’t need to. I heard the news.”

“You are the news,” the billionaire quips. “I don’t need your sympathy, give it to her husband.”

Clark allows a silence to drift between them for a few minutes that made his skin itch. He didn’t need the man they call Superman to stand in a graveyard with him dancing around the topic of his recently passed ex fiancé. He didn’t need the man they call Superman to stand in a graveyard with him dancing around what the real discussion was. 

“I don’t feel responsible even if it was due to the attack of Darkseid,” Bruce grunts. “I’m not suicidal and out here planning to end it all because she’s dead,” he states forcefully. “I just wanted some quiet.”

“Did you still love her?” Clark finally asks, bravely. 

Bruce meets his gaze head on, because he’s never been a coward even for things he’d rather not say or do. “No. But I always understood her breaking things off. I’ve never begrudged her that right to a simpler life.”

“And then she ran off and married the crown prince of Genovia,” Clark huffs and shakes his head. “Because being a royal was much simpler a life, obviously.”

Bruce had no comeback for that, which made him deflate some. Clark obviously noticed the minute slump in his shoulder as the hand that was on his arm wrapped further around and engulfed him a half hug. Usually Bruce would protest…loudly. Today, however, he merely leaned into the comforting touch.

“She deserved the life of splendor and excess I wouldn’t give her,” Bruce tells him flatly. “The life she wanted. She didn’t understand the life that I had already chosen, but if I’m being fair I was naïve myself back then. I didn’t understand I couldn’t have someone like her and do what I do.”

Clark gives him a thoughtful look, “What do you mean, B?”

“I couldn’t be Batman and be the husband of someone like her. Someone who needed constant attention while travelling around the world nonstop in order to be happy,” Bruce sneers. “She hated Gotham and couldn’t wait to get out of it.” 

Clark tilts his head, “Yeah, I guess it’d be difficult to be the bat vigilante of Gotham if you’re busy vacationing in Rio.”

Bruce grunts his assent and pulls away slightly. “Yeah. But I was twenty-five and thought I was in love, how perfectly cliché.” Bruce scrapes a toe of his dress shoe in the earth below and mumbles, “I also knew she had wandering eyes and excused it.” Under his breath he mutters, “I seem to excuse a lot from people for the master detective I’m supposed to be.”

“Well that’s not fair to yourself, B.”

“Isn’t it though?” Bruce huffs. “She may have cared for me – and I definitely appreciate her keeping my secret even to her grave – but she found it so easy to leave because it was never about me.”

Clark nods his head, “You seem convinced you knew her motives.”

“I’m not convinced of anything, I know her motives because I got an apology letter from her a year ago. I never replied.”

“Oh,” Clark straightens. “I see.”

Bruce rolls his eyes, “I didn’t tell you about it, because what does it matter? It was ten years ago almost. I’m long since over it.”

Clark eyes him, “Sure, of course you are. How could I forget that you’re known to let things go?”

Bruce shoots him a half-hearted glare and Clark grins at him. 

Turning away from Clark, Bruce moves to go sit on the stone bench he installed close to the mausoleum seven years ago.

Clark plops next to him with a soft noise and hums slightly to himself.

Bruce rolls his eyes. “Like I said I’m not suicidal or falling to pieces. I just wanted a little quiet without company.”

Clark grins over at him, “I don’t plan to keep you company, B. I plan to annoy you.”

That startles a laugh out of Bruce and he shakes his head. “Well in that case.”

They fall into a companionable silence for a few minutes before Clark looks over at Bruce. The man they call Batman feels his stare and meets it nearly immediately. Clark’s eyes are the bluest shade he’s probably ever seen. He gets lost when they are fixed this way on his own. It makes him feel a blush begin to form and force himself to look away.

“Hey, Bruce?” Clark asks and Bruce looks back over at him cautiously. “You want to have dinner with me?”

“What?” Bruce replies, confused. “Clark, you know Alfred started fixing enough food to feed an army the second you came on the sensors, you don’t have to ask to eat.”

“No, silly,” Clark grins. “In an actual restaurant. That I pay for. And take you to. And we have a wonderful time fighting over what constitutes an appropriate amount of money spent on wine and why it matters. And I take you home afterwards and we awkwardly lean back and forth deciding if making out on the first date is considered too fast in our case considering how long we’ve danced around wanting to.”

Bruce sat for a moment in shocked silence then gathered his wits enough to say with a rush of air, “Clark…” as he looked away.

The Kansas raised Kryptonian gently took the Gothamite by the chin and turned his face to him in order to show how sincere he was being through his eyes. “Bruce,” he said softly, “I want to. I want you. I have wanted you for years.”

Bruce bit his lip and closed his eyes leaning into the touch. “This is probably terrible of us to be discussing after talking about my dead ex-fiancé.”

“Absolutely disrespectful,” Clark agrees. “But I’m tired of waiting and watching. I can make you happy, baby. I understand your mission. I have my own. I don’t want a dime of your money. I have a job, I don’t have any interest in your connections. I just want you.”

Bruce opens his eyes, feeling them mist over. “I…”

“No, don’t,” Clark says desperately and leans closer. “You’d never need to be worried about me straying on you. I’m not a cheater, and I never will be. I’d be so good to you, baby,” he implores Bruce. “Trust me. I’d love you so fiercely, you’d never question it.”

Bruce looks into his eyes and holds the stare before sighing and looking away. “Oh, you beautiful man. I’m not worried about how you’ll treat me.” Bruce chuckles sadly. “I know you’d make me feel like a king.” The Gothamite does feel the tears well up and he holds them back as hard as he can. “But I’m bad at love,” he shrugs. “I’m completely terrible at it actually. I can do advanced math in seconds, and take on an army of fifty by myself but…I can’t keep people for very long because I’m not…” Bruce pauses and shuffles his feet in front of himself. “You were right earlier, I can’t let things go. I freeze you out when I don’t know what to do. I’m not attentive to your needs. Despite the rumors I’m actually pretty sexually reserved, and I don’t pay attention to things like intimacy. I may…love you, Clark,” he smiles through the tears that start to fall, “but I will tear a kind heart like yours apart; because I’m not kind. I’m jealous, and secretive, and egotistical, and stubborn, and angry, and…”

Clark shushes him. “You think I haven’t known those things about you?” he asks incredulously. “Bruce,” he sighs affectionately, “I’ve known you for twelve and half years. There is not a single thing you do that surprises me.”

“Doubtful,” Bruce says and pulls completely away beginning to stand and putting his hands in his coat’s pockets. 

Clark sighs and stays seated. “Give me something then,” he says.

With a confused frown, Bruce half turns to him. “What?”

“A reason,” Clark says seriously. “A real reason; an example actually. Give me an example of what you think has classified you as so bad at love that I should run for the hills while I still can.”

Bruce scoffs. “What are you, twelve?”

“No,” Clark says with a smirk, “but you’re definitely being challenged here, B. You do like a challenge.”

“When they’re not completely juvenile challenges,” Bruce counters and crosses his arms over his chest. “You want me to just…what?”

“Give me an example.” 

Bruce eyes him critically, before grunting and looking off into the distance. “You say I can’t surprise you anymore, huh?”

Clark’s smile is soft as he looks up at him, “Not a whole lot, no.”

With a raised brow and a challenging air, he says, “I would have eloped with Selina when I was eighteen if I hadn’t caught her with some horny, middle aged rent-a-cop the night before I left Gotham for five years. I had seriously bought the fucking ring and had tickets to fly us to Italy for the honeymoon. I had been with her for two and a half years at that point, despite me knowing she was a wildcard at best and time bomb at worst. But she was exciting and didn’t treat me like a freak. Then I find out she’s a borderline sex addict that had been sleeping around a lot with other people – like a lot of people, and not just any people but criminals, married men, college students, you name it – from the time we had gotten together right under my nose. That entire time. And her excuse was because it was fun feeling like she got away with it without me knowing, and instead of dealing with the pain in a normal healthy way I ran away from the country and trained to become an assassin with the league of shadows.”

Clark nods and says, “Yeah, okay. You got me, I didn’t know all of that backstory but I wouldn’t say I’m that surprised.”

Bruce scoffs derisively and turns back around to head to the mansion again with a roll of his eyes. “You completely missed the fucking point of that truncated story, but whatever Clark. I’m not doing this with you.”

Clark jumps up and walks just behind him as he says almost teasingly, “Doing what? Failing at driving me away or failing at not making me want to pick you up and actually do it with you?”

Bruce narrowed his eyes at the distance but continues walking as the rain picks up its strength. “If what you wanted was sex with me, I would have let you fuck me years ago. I’m telling you, I don’t do well in love, okay? Sex? Fine. Dating? Sure. Love? No.”

Clark bites his lip. “Fine,” he calls and stays walking behind Bruce. “Then just date me. For fun. No love.”

“What?!” Bruce spins to face his friend and current irritation. “You can’t be serious. One minute you’re professing your love to me, now I’m just a casual date? You really think I’m buying that bag of bullshit?”

“I think I’ll do whatever I can and wait however long it takes for you to see me,” Clark implores. “I think you want me as much as I do you or you wouldn’t say you love me.” Bruce’s face hardens. “I think,” Clark steps forward into Bruce personal space, standing toe to toe with the man they call the Batman, with a searching expression, “that you can’t give me an example because you know deep down there aren’t any that will scare me away.”

Bruce raises an eyebrow and crosses his arms, assessing the man in front of him. “Fine,” he says challengingly. “I’ll go on one date with you, and on this date I will allow you to do your worst in wooing me or whatever the fuck you want to do. And in return, I will give you my examples for why it won’t work long term with…me.”

The Kryptonian’s expression morphed into one full of relief and joy. “Thank you,” he tells Bruce, failing at concealing how truly happy he was. “You won’t regret this, I swear it.” He then leans forward and kisses Bruce’s temple which makes the other man turn deep scarlet before lifting off.

Bruce watches him take off and sighs deeply. No, Clark, he thinks to himself knowing the man could hear if he said it out loud, but I’m afraid you will. He turns to head back to the mansion and feels his heart stutter as he thinks what he would do if Clark regrets their time together than calls off even their friendship. I’ll be truly alone then, he thinks and shakes his head. What the fuck is he doing?


End file.
